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2010/06/06

Vienna Sightseeing with Hebizô and Umino
On the Saturday, a group of five students of Japanese Language Division of University of Vienna went for sightseeing with Hebizô and Umino.
First we met at their hotel and went to Schloß Schönbrunn. We really really had luck, because of the beautiful weather (only rainy days before...), but unfortunatelly there were so many people at Schloß Schönbrunn, who wanted to visit the castle (and not the park!). So we would have to wait for about 3 hours to get inside the castle. That plan was skipped and we took a little walk through the park and went to the Gloriette, were we had some ice cream. Yummy!
Hebizô and Umino are interested in flea markets and so we went to Naschmarkt, which was really really crowed! They were impressed by the flea market and the food market at Naschmarkt and we also visited Cha-no-Ma, a Japanese tea shop, and Nipponya, a Japanese supermarket. Already quite hungry, we were looking for a nice place for lunch...but something embarrasing happend...

The Comic Essay 「日本人の知らない日本語」 (Japanese that Japanese don't know) is created by the Japanese language teacher Umino and the mangaka (漫画家) Hebizô. Umino's experience as a Japanese language teacher for foreigners in Japan are the basic for the Comic Essay, which contains short and funny episodes with her students.
Currently, 2 Volumes of 日本人の知らない日本語 were released and teacher Umino and mangaka Hebizô traveled to Europe for some inspiration for the 3rd Volume. They visited Japanese language students in Belgium, Germany, Swiss - and Austria!
Here are my memories of the events with Hebizô and Umino ミ☆

2010/04/03

Bunka Dolls were famous between Taishô (1912-1926) and early Shôwa Period (1927-1937). The doll's body and clothes are completely made from fabrics. Japanese fabrics (chirimen, 縮緬）are used for the clothes, but they are Western style clothes. Sometimes, traditional Japanese clothes are combined with Western elements and so on. During Meiji (1868-1912) and Taishô (1912-1926) Period, a lot of Western style dolls came to Japan. According to this influence, the Western elements in the dolls' clothes are mainly bonnets and other headpieces.

Recently, Bunka Dolls became famous again. You can find several homepages with nice pictures of Bunka Dolls, or instructions for making them by yourself.

You fell in love with that cute Japanese Bunka Dolls?
On Yahoo!Auction, you can find some by Bunka Ningyô - Natsukashii Araka -->Just follow this link! The auction starts at 3,000 Yen.
If you insert "文化人形" at the Yahoo!Auctions page, you can find a lot! Not only the dolls itself, but also the fabrics for the clothes are found there.

2010/03/28

Hanami (花見, lit. "watching flowers") is a very known tradition in Japan.

In the end of March and the beginning of April, Japans cherry trees (sakura, 桜) begin to bloom and visitors - Japanese and Non-Japanese - will make a picknick unter the beautiful pink and white blossoms with their co-workers, friends or families and beloved ones.

This 'picknick under cherry blossoms' is very famous and recently the term Hanami is also know outside of Japan.

How to do a Hanami? This is quite simple!

Usually Japanese go for a Hanami on a Sunday, because most of them have their day off. The most favourite location for Hanami is a public Park, like Yoyogi Park or Ueno Park in Tôkyô. Ueno Park is really popular and you hardly find free seats under the cherry trees. Yoyogi Park is very popular among young people, because the park is located next to the fashion-district Harajuku and on the bridge Meiji jingu-mae cosplayers and otaku from Japan and all over the world come together.

Very typical for a Japanese Hanami are the blue sheets (available in different sizes at any 100-Yen Shop). Groups of five to ten people or more sit on them under the pink or white cherry blossoms and enjoy a picknick together. Mostly with a lot (and I really mean a lot!) of alcohol, like (Japanese) beer or sake (Japanese rice wine, お酒).

2010/02/28

Matcha is powdered Green Tea and can be used in various delicious ways. Originally, Matcha is used for the traditional Japanese tea ceremony, the tea's colour is an intensive green and Matcha has a slightly bitter taste. Within the Japanese tea ceremony, Matcha is served together with typical Japanese sweets (和菓子, wagashi).

However, the Japanese food industry invented also other products with Matcha, like Matcha chocolate, cakes, cookies or even drinks.

A 'Matcha Frappuchino' is available at Japanese Starbucks stores, and also other coffee shops in Japan offer drinks like 'Matcha Latte' (frozen, iced or hot).